Our new book, Icons: 100 Extraordinary Objects from Sotheby's History, highlights the auction house’s longstanding relationship with some of the most famous masterpieces to ever exist.
The book takes a deep dive into 100 of the most iconic objects to pass through the auction house. From national treasures like the Declaration of Independence to Banksy’s unforgettable, partially shredded Girl With Balloon—and from a 67-million-year-old Tyrannosaurus rex to Maurizio Cattelan’s infamous banana—this curated selection of white-glove work represents not just exceptional objects, but pivotal moments in art market history.
Featured artists include Vincent van Gogh, Pablo Picasso, Georgia O’Keefe, Frida Kahlo, Helen Frankenthaler, Jean-Michel Basquiat, Louise Bourgeois, Joan Mitchell, Edward Hopper, and Piet Mondrian. Brands such as Mercedez-Benz, Phillipe Patek, Tiffany, Van Cleef and Arpels, and Fabergé are also highlighted with their stand-out creations, as are coveted items from the collections of Jackie Kennedy Onassis, David Bowie, and Tupac Shakur.
Written by Sotheby’s specialists, the texts explain the history and significance of each work, making this a really engaging way to learn about the cultural importance of each masterpiece alongside its trading history.
Here we take a quick look at three of our favorite objects from the 100 featured in the book. And believe us, it was almost impossible to pick just three.
Tyrannosaurus rex, “Sue,” Late Cretaceous (c. 67 million years ago) Approximately 90 percent complete fossil skeleton found in the Hell Creek Formation, Cheyenne River Indian Reservation, near the town of Faith, South Dakota, United States. Sotheby’s New York, October 4, 1997, lot 1 Estimate in excess of $1,000,000 Sold for $8,362,500.
Tyrannosaurus rex, “Sue,” Late Cretaceous (c. 67 million years ago). Image © Field Museum (2018), photo by Martin Baumgaertner. Approximately 90 percent complete fossil skeleton found in the Hell Creek Formation, Cheyenne River Indian Reservation, near the town of Faith, South Dakota, United States Field Museum, Chicago
"A Dinosaur in Manhattan?” The question posed in the headline of the Los Angeles Times was as sensational as the discovery that brought the fossil to Sotheby’s headquarters on York Avenue. On a gray Saturday in 1997, the bones of a sixty-seven-million year-old Tyrannosaurus rex named “Sue” took center stage in the New York salesroom, marking a historic moment for the house as it did for the world of paleontology.
It was the first-ever auction of a dinosaur, and in just nine minutes it came to achieve $8,362,500— the most ever paid for a fossil at the time. The fossilized bones were still in field jackets and unmounted when they arrived at Sotheby’s, but the winning bidder was undeterred by the monumental undertaking of putting them together. The fossil was purchased at sale by the Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago, the funding for which came from an unlikely roster of backers—the McDonald’s Corporation, Ronald McDonald House Charities,Walt Disney World Resorts, and the California State University system, among a slate of other private donors. It was a moment of unprecedented cooperation between corporate institutions and scientific ambition. However, “Sue’s” story didn’t begin in a bidding war; it started with a flat tire.
On August 12, 1990, the tires on a truck from the Black Hills Institute of Geological Research, a privately funded corporation led by Peter Larson that specializes in the excavation and preparation of fossils, suffered a serious leak at an excavation site near Faith, South Dakota. As the team went off to repair the tire, Susan Hendrickson, a volunteer, stayed behind. While wandering several miles from the site, she came upon hundreds of bone fragments at the base of a cliff. As she looked up, she spotted vertebrae sticking out of the cliff face. Hendrickson retrieved a couple of the fragments and showed them to Larson upon his return, who identified them as vertebrae from a large carnivorous dinosaur. What Hendrickson had discovered would reveal itself upon excavation to be the most complete Tyrannosaurus rex skeleton ever unearthed, nearly 90 percent intact.
Banksy Girl With Balloon, 2006 Spray paint and acrylic on canvas, mounted on board, in artist’s frame. Sotheby’s London, October 5, 2018, lot 67 Estimate £200,000–300,000 ($262,088–393,133). Sold for £1,042,000 ($1,365,482) Girl Without Balloon, 2018 Spray paint and acrylic on canvas, remote-controlled shredding, in artist’s frame. Sotheby’s London, October 14, 2021, lot 7 Estimate £4,000,000–6,000,000 ($5,474,203–8,211,304). Sold for £18,582,000 ($25,430,410)
Banksy, Girl Without Balloon (previously Girl With Balloon), 2018. Private Collection. Courtesy of Pest Control Office, Banksy, 2018. Spray paint and acrylic on canvas, remote-controlled shredding, in artist’s frame, 60 × 30⅞ × 7 in. (142 × 78 × 18 cm)
“Going, going, gone . . .” wrote Banksy in the caption on his Instagram, below a now-infamous image of his painting Girl With Balloon, hanging half-shredded on the wall of the salesroom at Sotheby’s London. The witty appropriation of the phrase, long-standing in its association with auction parlance, is a most fitting tagline for the stunning feat of artistic subterfuge Banksy brilliantly enacted on the night of October 5, 2018.
Banksy’s Girl With Balloon was the last lot in the Contemporary Evening Auction, consigned for sale by Banksy’s press office at the time. Entirely oblivious to the shock that was to come, Alex Branczik, then–Senior Director and European Head of Contemporary Art, explained that Sotheby’s complied in the consignor’s contractual requests: “that [the work] was in the evening sale and that it should be on view during the auction”—also, that it was displayed in its original artist’s frame. Hidden within that ornate gilded frame surrounding Banksy’s ubiquitous spraypainted image was a remote-controlled shredding mechanism, operated by an anonymous patron in the salesroom, that began whirring and blaring as soon as auctioneer Oliver Barker hammered down the gavel on the winning bid, selling the work for £1,042,000 ($1,365,482).
“I realized immediately what had happened,” recalled Branczik. “Because in that moment all these slightly odd individual things that had occurred throughout the consignment process suddenly made sense.” A gobsmacked audience of patrons and Sotheby’s staff alike, looked on as the canvas slid down out of its frame, appearing in neatly cut strips as it passed through the other side. To the surprise of the artist, the mechanism malfunctioned, pausing so the work hung caught in a balance: half shredded, half intact.
The morning after the sale, Branczik received a call from Sotheby’s CEO at the time. “He made me swear that I didn’t know and that none of my team knew that this was about to happen, and that was very easy for me to do.” Despite the speculation, Sotheby’s was entirely unaware of, and uninvolved in, Banksy’s plan.
Hermès The Original Birkin Crafted for Jane Birkin, 1985. Black leather box with brass hardware, Sotheby’s Paris, July 10, 2025, lot 8. Sold for €8,582,500 ($10,100,000)
Hermès, The Original Birkin Crafted for Jane Birkin, 1985. Valuence Japan Inc. Black leather box with brass hardware, 10⅝ × 14⅛ × 8¼ in. (27 × 36 × 21 cm)
The story of the Original Birkin is a parable of modern celebrity. On an Air France flight in 1984, Jane Birkin—singer, actress, and muse of her generation—found herself seated next to Hermès artistic director Jean-Louis Dumas. Juggling her infant daughter Charlotte, Birkin lamented that she could never find a handbag that balanced elegance with the practical demands of everyday life. Dumas sketched on the spot. By 1985 Hermès had produced the prototype and with Birkin’s blessing, dedicated the model in her name. Thus, out of their serendipitous encounter and her passing comment, a modern icon was born.
The sensation caused by the Original Birkin in its debut at Sotheby’s Paris testified to the inconceivable ubiquity the bag had taken on in the forty years since its conception. The remarkable €8,582,500 ($10,100,000) result likewise enumerated the tremendous growth in the market for luxury goods within the same period—a category that the Birkin bag itself was instrumental in creating. But to the world over, the object represented more than a brand, and indeed, more than a bag. The Original Birkin was endowed with a value that was in many ways entirely immaterial— it represented both the genesis and the pinnacle of style and of rarity, but above all else, it served as the material embodiment of its namesake muse.
The prototype is markedly different from the standardized Birkin bags that have continued in its legacy. Its proportions combine elements of both the 35 and 40 sizes, making it simultaneously compact and capacious. It uses closed metal rings to secure the handles, as opposed to the open-top rings found on current models; it features gilded brass hardware, later replaced with a gold-plated alternative; it is outfitted with the .clair company zipper which Hermès still purchased at the time the prototype was made. It likewise bears a fixed shoulder strap, perhaps added in deference to Birkin’s original plea for greater mobility of use, but which was later abandoned in the commercialized model. By all formal considerations, the Birkin sold at Sotheby’s on July 10, 2025, is the only one of its kind.
Beyond its technical details, however, what gives this model its distinctly singular quality is the life it lived alongside Jane. There was an understated elegance and undeniable sense of cool nonchalance with which Birkin toted her eponymous accessory. She carried it everywhere, so devoutly that it became inextricable from her public image. The initials J.B. are stamped inside, and it bears the faint outline of stickers for Médecins du Monde and UNICEF that she had affixed to the front—evidence of Birkin’s lifelong activism as much as it is of her style.
The sale was record-breaking from its first bid. Opening at €1 million, it had already doubled the world record for a handbag—set in 2021 when the Hermès White Himalaya Niloticus Crocodile Diamond Retourne Kelly 28 achieved $513,040. Gasps filled the salesroom with every higher bid, as nine determined collectors drove the price to its eight-digit total. By the sale’s close, the Original Birkin had become the most valuable handbag ever sold at auction, the most expensive fashion item ever sold in Europe, and the highest-priced luxury item in the history of Sotheby’s Paris.
Icons: 100 Extraordinary Objects from Sotheby's History, is published in tandem with Sotheby’s marquee move back to the Breuer—a building known for its historical prominence, having previously belonged to the Whitney Museum of American Art, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the Frick Collection. Since many of Sotheby’s sales are ultimately private, this book is an unprecedented gateway of access into the auction house, giving readers an exclusive glimpse into artworks from some of the most prestigious private collections. Take a closer look at Icons: 100 Extraordinary Objects from Sotheby's History.
